, 1887-09-01
PLUMAGE FOR LADIES, HATS.

InsectIvorous Birds Not Used for That
Purpose-suppIy from Foreign Lands.
From time 10 time a great ado is made
by the friends of the feathered kingdom
because women will insist on decorating
their hats and bonnets with the plumes
and heads of unfortunate birds. Such
decoration has long been pronounced
ridiculous and in bad taste, but the
words of the critics had no effect until
they showed the farmers the danger
which menaced them in the destruction
Of insectivorous birds. This agitation re-
suited in the passage of a law forbidding
the killing of this class of birds, and in
some states the penalty was made so
severe that a woman would be liable to
arrest if caught IN the street wearing
one of the protected birds. Even now,
however, it is frequently asserted that the
law is not enforced as it should be, and
spasmodic efforts are made to stop the
traffic in this line of goods. Investigation
shows that the law is not violated so
much as is commonly supposed.
Before a bird appears as the decoration
for a bonnet, it passes through a good
many hands. Soon after the hunter
bags it, it is turned over to the commits
" Vi ia" pboSh Hail. do bt ID
termed, and then goes to some big manu-
featuring house, where it is made up for
the trade. Then the jobber takes charge
of it, and after perhaps one or two more
transfers the real milliner gets it, and
places it upon a bit of feminine headgear
to charm the eyes of the masculine world.
There are in this city several commits
sion or raw stock houses, which buy
: FrnD, l,,-+ore Ill o,-ar A. oa,.r ~.
of these houses is located on Cortlandt
street. A reporter went through the en-
tire establishment without discovering an
insectivorous bird. The staple birds in
the trade are the tern and heron, although
good many gulls are used. The feath-
ers of these birds are all of quiet colors,
but that does not make the slightest diff
ference, as the manufacturers turn out
any color desired. All they want is that
the feathers shall be strong and well
shaped, and then they can turn out a
more gaudily colored bird than nature
ever produced in her most eccentric
mood. In the great manufacturing es-
adjustments not a single feather is
wasted, even the small feathers on the
body being used in paste work. Such
patchwork is naturally not noteworthy
for strict adherence to nature, but it sells
just as well nevertheless.
h commission man whose place was
visited told the reporter that probably not
one-tenth of the birds used by milliners
in this country now are insectiverous, and
most of the few that are used come from
Africa or South America, where the sup
ply is inexhaustible. The tern and heron,
which are chiefly used, are fish eaters,
and their loss will never be felt. The
prices of these birds vary greatly from
time to time. At present a tern skin,
preserved by arsenic, just as it, come
from the hunters, is worth from forty to
fifty cents in the city. The aigret, or
plume, of the snowy heron, is worth SIS
or $50 an ounce, but only last February
it brought $62 an ounce. 1t takes q
dozen or more birds to supply an ounce
Of these plumes, but, of course, the com
mon feathers are also used.-New York
Commercial Advertiser.